1 Jn. 5:19
To detect the working of evil spirits upon the mind, let the believer note the way in which his "thoughts" come. If the mind is working easily, quietly, in normal action in the duty of the moment, and sudden "flashes," "suggestions" or apparent "thoughts" arise, not in sequence, or in orderly connection with the work he has in hand, then the enemy may be counterfeiting the operation of the person's own mind, and trying to insert his suggestions into it as if they were the outcome of the man's own thinking; for when he is in the process of thinking, the lying spirits seek to inject some thought, suggestion or feeling - the first into the mind, and the last into the spirit.
The danger at this point is for the believer to be ensnared by the simultaneous working of his own mind, and the presentation to the mind of the evil spirit's "pictures" or visions, which he thinks come from his own "imagination"; or very subtly refined suggestions which have no appearance of being supernatural, or even distinct from the person at all. Many think all that is "supernatural" is of necessity strikingly marvelous, and awesome, whereas the enemy's working is very ordinary - so ordinary that he is unrecognized, and the operations of the supernatural appear so "natural," that they are not looked upon as supernatural. The Scripture statement of "the whole world lying in the evil one" ( 1 Jn. 5:19; top ) is so true, that his speakings and workings are accepted and followed and yielded to, as the "ordinary" things of life, and as the ordinary operations of the mental faculties. The kingdom of darkness is near and "natural" to all the world under the rule of the prince of darkness.
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